Category Archives: Sensitivity & feedbacks

Mainstreaming ECS ~ 2 C

Posted on May 19, 2013 | 518 Comments

by Judith Curry

Humanity has a second chance to stop dangerous climate change. Temperature data from the last decade offers an unexpected opportunity to stay below the agreed international target of 2 °C of global warming. – New Scientist

Continue reading →

→ 518 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

DocMartyn’s estimate of climate sensitivity and forecast of future global temperatures

Posted on May 16, 2013 | 556 Comments

by DocMartyn

My forecast is that temperatures will remain flat until 2040.

Continue reading →

→ 556 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Meta-uncertainty in the determination of climate sensitivity

Posted on April 17, 2013 | 637 Comments

by Judith Curry

Two heavyweight climate scientists have published very different ideas about how much the Earth is going to warm in the coming decades. – Washington Weather Gang

Continue reading →

→ 637 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

The Forest 2006 climate sensitivity study and misprocessing of data – an update

Posted on April 10, 2013 | 436 Comments

by Nicholas Lewis

Some of you may recall my guest post at Climate Etc last June, here, questioning whether the results of the Forest et al., 2006, (F06) study on estimating climate sensitivity might have arisen from misprocessing of data.

Continue reading →

→ 436 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

UK MSM on climate sensitivity

Posted on March 31, 2013 | 355 Comments

by Judith Curry

If climate scientists were credit-rating agencies, climate sensitivity would be on negative watch. But it would not yet be downgraded. – The Economist

Continue reading →

→ 355 Comments

Posted in climate models, Communication, Sensitivity & feedbacks

New perspectives on climate sensitivity

Posted on March 10, 2013 | 491 Comments

by Judith Curry

Here is a summary of some important new papers on the topics of climate sensitivity and attribution.

Continue reading →

→ 491 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Sensitivity & feedbacks

Sensitivity about sensitivity

Posted on February 4, 2013 | 1,165 Comments

by Judith Curry

. . . the IPCC’s sensitivity estimate cannot readily be reconciled with forcing estimates and observational data. – James Annan

Continue reading →

→ 1,165 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Climate sensitivity in the AR5 SOD

Posted on December 19, 2012 | 434 Comments

by Judith Curry

By far the most important debate about climate change is taking place among scientists, on the issue of climate sensitivity: How much warming will a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide actually produce?  - Matt Ridley

Continue reading →

→ 434 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Clouds and MAGIC

Posted on November 28, 2012 | 683 Comments

by Judith Curry

Ocean clouds obscure warming’s fate, create ‘fundamental’ problems for models. – Paul Voosen
.

→ 683 Comments

Posted in climate models, Data and observations, Sensitivity & feedbacks

Sensitivity of the nocturnal boundary layer to added longwave radiative forcing

Posted on July 20, 2012 | 162 Comments

by Judith Curry

So, if you increase the longwave radiative forcing from CO2, which of the following happens?

  1. heating of the near surface ground temperature
  2. heating of the atmosphere
  3. heating of the deep ground temperature
  4. the heat is lost to radiative emission from the skin surface.

Continue reading →

→ 162 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Questioning the Forest et al. (2006) sensitivity study

Posted on June 25, 2012 | 894 Comments

by Nicholas Lewis

Re:  Data inconsistencies in Forest, Stone and Sokolov (2006)  GRL paper 2005GL023977 ‘Estimated PDFs of climate system properties including natural and anthropogenic forcings‘

Continue reading →

→ 894 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Climate sensitivity discussion thread

Posted on May 10, 2012 | 699 Comments

by Judith Curry

There are several recent estimates of climate sensitivity that are worth taking a look at.

Continue reading →

→ 699 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

21st century solar cooling

Posted on March 10, 2012 | 509 Comments

by Judith Curry

During the 20th century, solar activity increased in magnitude to a so-called grand maximum. It is probable that this high level of solar activity is at or near its end. It is of great interest whether any future reduction in solar activity could have a significant impact on climate that could partially offset the projected anthropogenic warming. (Jones et al. 2012).

Continue reading →

→ 509 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks, Solar

Nonequilibrium thermodynamics and maximum entropy production in the Earth system

Posted on January 10, 2012 | 364 Comments

by Judith Curry

Albert Einstein on thermodynamics:

A theory is more impressive the greater the simplicity of its premises, the more different are the kinds of things it relates, and the more extended its range of applicability. Therefore, the deep impression which classical thermodynamics made on me. It is the only physical theory of universal content, which I am convinced, that within the framework of applicability of its basic concepts will never be overthrown.

Continue reading →

→ 364 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Another IPCC error: cloud albedo forcing

Posted on December 14, 2011 | 104 Comments

by Paul Matthews

Climate Etc has discussed the IPCC’s new protocol for alleged errors and an error found by Nic Lewis regarding climate sensitivity. This post discusses another error in IPCC AR4, one that has been around for some time but has only recently been reported to the IPCC.

Continue reading →

→ 104 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

WHT on Schmittner et al. on climate sensitivity

Posted on November 29, 2011 | 269 Comments
by WebHubTelescope
.
Schmittner et al have written a paper titled “Climate Sensitivity Estimated from Temperature Reconstructions of the Last Glacial Maximum” (Science Nov 24. 2011).

→ 269 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Feedback in climate

Posted on October 16, 2011 | 496 Comments

by Chris Colose

There has been a lot of blog interest recently on feedback theory and climate sensitivity (e.g., Isaac Held, ClimateAudit, Science of Doom, Nick Stokes, one on control theory here at Climate Etc.).

Continue reading →

→ 496 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

CO2 control knob technical discussion thread

Posted on October 11, 2011 | 478 Comments

by Judith Curry

The original thread for Andy Lacis’ post got derailed by non-technical comments.  This thread is STRICTLY for technical comments (heavy moderation will be imposed); make your general comments on the original thread.

→ 478 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Climate, control theory, feedback: does it make sense?

Posted on October 10, 2011 | 275 Comments

by Richard Saumarez

You may wonder why a medic is writing a post on control theory in climate.

Continue reading →

→ 275 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Trends in tropospheric humidity

Posted on September 25, 2011 | 85 Comments

by Garth Paltridge

It is difficult these days to get a paper published in a mainstream climate journal if it emphasises the uncertainty associated with some basic aspect of global warming.

Continue reading →

→ 85 Comments

Posted in Data and observations, Sensitivity & feedbacks

Water vapor feedback: evaporation

Posted on September 24, 2011 | 114 Comments

by Judith Curry

New research from Carnegie’s Global Ecology department concludes that evaporated water helps cool the earth as a whole, not just the local area of evaporation, demonstrating that evaporation of water from trees and lakes could have a cooling effect on the entire atmosphere. 
.

→ 114 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Cloud wars

Posted on September 21, 2011 | 231 Comments

by Judith Curry

Circa 2003-2005, we had the “hockey wars”.  In 2005-2006, we had the “hurricane wars”.  It looks like this is the season for “cloud wars.”

Continue reading →

→ 231 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Probabilistic estimates of transient climate sensitivity

Posted on September 14, 2011 | 213 Comments

by Judith Curry

An important new paper on this topic has been published in J. Climate, that raises the bar in terms of uncertainty analysis.

Continue reading →

→ 213 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks, Uncertainty

Spencer & Braswell: Part III

Posted on September 6, 2011 | 476 Comments

by Judith Curry

The story surrounding Spencer & Braswell has gotten more interesting with the pre-publication of the rebuttal paper by Dessler.

Continue reading →

→ 476 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Climate sensitivity to ocean heat transport

Posted on August 16, 2011 | 98 Comments

by Judith Curry

A paper in press in the Journal of Climate  provides some insight into the interaction of cloud feedback with ocean heat transport.

Continue reading →

→ 98 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks